


Down in Flames

by bitboozy



Series: Start a Fire [5]
Category: Broadchurch
Genre: Established Relationship, F/M, Post-Series 2, Romance
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-03-16
Updated: 2021-03-16
Packaged: 2021-03-25 10:40:22
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,509
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30087834
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bitboozy/pseuds/bitboozy
Summary: Alec is determined to plan a birthday party for Ellie to solidify their relationship in the eyes of the town. Meanwhile, the position of DI opens up in Broadchurch.
Relationships: Alec Hardy & Ellie Miller, Alec Hardy/Ellie Miller
Series: Start a Fire [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1567420
Comments: 17
Kudos: 37





	Down in Flames

**Author's Note:**

> Hello from this series I thought was finished! 
> 
> *shrug emoji* It started haunting my brain, so here you go. I know it's been almost a year since the last installment, I hope you still remember/are interested in this one! Thanks for reading!

The sun is not quite up yet when his ears pick up a faint rattling sound.

His eyelids flutter open and he squints as he vaguely glances around, orienting himself.

Ellie’s.

He’s at Ellie’s.

In Ellie’s bed.

There’s a brief, involuntary sigh of relief released from deep within. He’s on his back, naked, duvet barely coming up to his torso. Ellie’s head is resting on his arm, she's sleeping on her stomach, her legs tangled with his under the duvet. Equally naked. He smiles. It hasn’t gotten old yet and with any luck it never will.

He has flashes of the night before. Smooth, milky skin and hands everywhere. Ellie on top of him with her back arched, in all her glory. Then her legs over his shoulders, his tongue inside her while she bites into her hand to muffle her cries.

Some nights, when he stays over, they’re both exhausted and they barely manage a quick shag before succumbing to sleep. Other nights they seem to go on for _hours_ , never tiring of each other, like they’ve just discovered sex for the first time. Last night was such a night.

He smiles. Then yawns.

And the rattling noise is back.

He props himself up on his elbows and listens intently. With a frown, he reluctantly extracts himself from Ellie’s grasp and gets out of bed. He pulls on his briefs and the dressing gown he keeps hanging on the hook on the back of the door.

At the bottom of the stairs that lead to the attic bedroom is a baby gate.

And on the other side of the baby gate is a baby.

A three-year-old, rather, lest he let anyone forget it.

Fred, with his mother’s eyes, looks up at Alec.

“Hungry.”

Alec nearly snorts with laughter. Like mother like son. He descends the stairs quietly, unlocking the baby gate and scooping Fred up.

“You’re hungry?”

Fred nods. “Cereal please.”

“Five AM, lad,” Alec informs him groggily.

This means nothing to Fred. He simply stares blankly at his mother’s boyfriend.

“Right, okay.” Alec accepts his fate and begins the trek down to the kitchen. “But it’s back to bed after, yeah?”

Fred says nothing. Even at the age of three he knows better than to agree to these terms.

He eats his cereal at the kitchen table, in Alec’s lap. When it’s halfway eaten, he twists around to look back at Alec.

“More milk.”

Alec furrows his brows. “You’ll drown it.”

Fred shakes his head. “ _Drink_ it.”

Alec sighs and pours more milk into the cereal bowl. After Fred finishes the cereal, he precariously brings the bowl to his lips and drinks. Alec holds his breath until all the liquid is gone, not a drop spilt. Then Fred exhales with great satisfaction and grins up at him.

“Sleep with Mumma.”

“ _I_ sleep with Mumma,” Alec counters.

“Me too,” Fred offers helpfully.

Alec carries Fred back up the stairs contemplating his next move. Ellie, as he well knows, is currently stark naked in bed. He can’t very well just plop Fred down next to her without warning. He stands at the bottom of the attic stairway hesitantly.

“Mumma’s bed,” Fred says, as if Alec needs reminding, pointing up at the closed door.

“How about Fred’s bed?” Alec suggests weakly.

“No, Mumma.”

The door at the top of the stairs creaks open, revealing Ellie, in t-shirt and knickers. She breaks into a smile and a half-laugh immediately upon seeing them.

“What’s all this?”

“Mumma.” Fred grins. “Bed with you.”

Ellie tilts her head back toward the bedroom, gesturing for them to follow her back inside. At the top of the stairs, Fred holds his arms out to his mother and she takes him.

“Found this one at the bottom of the stairs beggin’ for cereal,” Alec tells her.

“Had a big bowl,” Fred says.

“Did you?” Ellie is as amused as she is sleepy. “Alec got you some cereal, eh?”

Fred nods. “And milk.”

“Deal was, he had to go back to bed after,” Alec adds.

“Bed with _you_ ,” Fred tells her matter-of-factly.

“He hoodwinked me.” Alec sits down on the edge of the bed with a yawn. He discards the robe and fishes around for his shirt on the floor. “Changed the terms of the deal.”

“Ah, clever boy, isn’t he.” She crawls into the other side of the bed with Fred, tucking him under the duvet. “Three-year-olds are much smarter than they look.”

As Alec swings his legs onto the bed and slips under the covers, Fred looks at him very seriously and says, “I’m three years old.”

“Aye, I know, mate.”

Fred yawns and snuggles into the pillow, warm and content in between his mother and her _friend_. His eyes close with little fuss. Ellie smiles at Alec across him.

“Sorry.”

“No bother,” he replies. “He’s got your eyes. Impossible to say no to the lad.”

Ellie grins, snuggling with Fred but looking at Alec. “Back to sleep now. We’ve hardly gotten any as it is.”

He nearly blushes. “Better not be a complaint I hear.”

“Nooooo, not hardly.” She touches his cheek and he kisses her hand. “Sleep now.”

He can’t remember a time he’s ever been happier.

________________________

It’s been five months since he first stayed the night. Five months since she told him she was _in this_. Since her father had walked in on them and Tom had nearly done the same.

He still has his dinky little flat in Bournemouth because he still has his stupid bloody job in Bournemouth. But he stays over in Broadchurch at least three nights a week. It’s not enough, but after all they’ve been through, he’ll take it.

Daisy has visited him a few times. She’d stayed with him for three days out of her Christmas holidays. This also was not enough, but it was the most either of them could handle. They’d had lunch with Ellie one of those days and the two had gotten along swimmingly. Then she was gone again and he’d returned to settling for the odd text here and there.

A month in, Ellie told Beth about their relationship. She wouldn’t tell him the precise details of the conversation but what he understands is that Beth, in the end, accepted it and wished them well. He has no need to pry any further.

They keep mostly to themselves when he’s in Broadchurch. Her father, who moved out again shortly after Alec and Ellie made it official, is anxious to have his grandchildren occupy his time and so offers to babysit regularly. They go to restaurants outside town. Not because they’re desperate to keep their relationship a secret, but because they feel they have so little time together that they are determined to be uninterrupted. They go to secluded beaches and hilltops, to the occasional film. But mostly they stay home, either with her boys or on their own, and they are very content to do so.

In spite of all this, Ellie has yet to say _I love you_. It used to be that each and every time _he_ would say it, there’d be a split second of hope and anticipation that she’d say it back. He’s gotten over that. He knows she loves him. He knows she’ll say it when she’s ready. Because he knows that the last man she said those words to betrayed her beyond measure. He can wait. He’s not going anywhere.

_______________________

“ _Fuck_.”

She’s still moving on top of him, slowly now, coming down. Her forehead is pressed to his, her eyes closed, breathing heavy and ragged. He grips her hips tightly and bucks up into her one last time then gasps as he comes; she kisses the rest of his breath right out of him. She drops her head to his shoulder as she stills completely.

“ _God_ ,” she exhales.

He brings a hand to her hair, the other stroking her back. They hadn’t even taken the time to remove her bra, that’s how frenzied it had been. The absolute _minute_ Tom had gone to bed.

“How’ve we done this?” She asks in disbelief, carefully moving off him and lying at his side. “We’ve somehow solved the equation. The perfect shag.”

He’s still too breathless to chuckle at her. “You say that as if it’s the exact same shag every time.”

“No.” She turns onto her back and he unabashedly stares at her tits as she stares at the ceiling. “Just the right combination of things. Of parts. Of people.”

“It’s not maths,” he tells her, a grin appearing on his face to prematurely betray his joke. “It’s called chemistry.”

She turns her head and stares at him. “Awful. Just awful.”

“Better than your thing about combination of parts.”

“Come off it, I’m post-coital.”

He laughs finally, turning onto his side and sliding an arm across her stomach. “So’m I.”

She pulls him in suddenly for a massive, unrelenting snog, knocking the breath clean out of them both.

“ _Easy_ , woman,” he says, but then he slides on top of her.

“Nothing about me is easy,” Ellie quips.

“Mm.” He kisses her softly this time, settling between her legs. She bends her knees and pins him there. “Can’t go again yet.”

“ _I know_ ,” she replies petulantly. “Doesn’t mean I don’t enjoy the feel of you between my legs.”

He kisses her again, rocking into her slowly despite the obvious handicap. “By the way,” he interjects between kisses. “I believe someone has a birthday comin’ up.”

She groans unhappily. He pins her arms at her sides, stilling her complaints. She somehow manages to entwine their fingers together and squeezes his hands with a sly smile.

“You’ll not distract me with intimacy,” Alec warns her.

“No?” She kisses his nose, then his cheek and his jaw. "I'm quite good at it."

He raises his head out of her reach, stretching his neck back. “Like to do somethin’ for you. For your birthday.”

“Oh, _why_.”

He frowns. “You like birthdays.”

“Not after forty,” she retorts. “Just like to have a night in with you and the boys.”

“We do that every week.”

“I know and I like it.”

Alec sighs and lets her go, moving off of her and maneuvering himself to a seated position against the headboard.

“What?” Ellie asks.

“Wouldn’t you like to do somethin’ more? Invite your dad, Lucy, Beth…?”

She props herself up on her elbow and looks up at him. “What’s this all about?”

He pouts a bit and shrugs. “Dunno. It’s the first real birthday since we’ve been properly together. S’pose I’d like to do somethin’….boyfriendish for you.”

She crinkles her nose. “Boyfriendish?”

“Got a better word?”

Ellie groans a bit and rotates onto her stomach, still propped up by her elbows. “Isn’t it enough that we have what we have? Don’t need to go…complicating it by involving other people. Trying to _prove_ ourselves to each other.”

Alec grimaces. “That’s not what I’m – “

“Yes, it is, it _is_ , you want to prove to the nosy citizens of Broadchurch that we’re together and it’s working and you can be good for me,” Ellie says. “But I don’t _care_ what they think.”

“Ellie, if we’re – “ He hesitates, the conversation is now paining him, and inches down to her level. “It can’t be like this forever. This keepin’ to ourselves thing. If we want to --- you know, if we’re goin’ to build a life together….”

She whines and hides her face in her pillow. “ _Alec_.”

“Look, I’m not rushin’ you. It’s not that I’m in a hurry or that I’m not happy with how things are. Just a reminder that, uh….you know, that relationships _grow_ , are meant to grow. A year from now I’d hope not to be drivin’ back and forth from Bournemouth three times a week,” he tells her.

“Oh.”

“You didn’t think it would be this way forever.”

“…No. I just.” She swipes her hair out of her face. “Guess I’ve just been enjoying living in the moment with you. I’ve honestly not thought about it.”

“Well.” He breathes out. “You don’t have think about it now. Just have to let me arrange somethin’ for your birthday.”

She smiles, her face half obfuscated by her pillow, and he finds it endlessly endearing.

“All right.”

“Good.” He leans down and kisses her forehead. And then: “Are you knackered?”

Ellie grins. Then slowly shakes her head from side to side slyly.

“Right.” He slides back down under the covers, then slips a hand between her legs. “Back to work then.”

______________________

Most of the afternoon has been wasted on a dead end. By the time Ellie gets back to her desk at CID, she’s so frustrated that she snaps three pencils in half. The fourth one she chews into with her teeth as she scans the same old CCTV again.

“Ellie.”

She sits up straight and swivels toward Elaine Jenkinson, who has just appeared beside her desk as if by magic.

“Ma’am.”

“My office.”

When Jenkinson turns her back, Ellie takes the chewed pencil and snaps it in half before following her.

She sits across from Jenkinson’s desk expectantly.

“Wanted to keep you in the loop on this” she says. “And let you know that Lynch has resigned his post. We’ll begin the search for a new DI on Monday.”

Ellie blinks at her. “The DI job’s open again.”

“Yes.” Jenkinson turns to her computer coolly. “If you’d like to throw your hat in the ring, do it by Friday.”

__________________________

The following evening, they go for drinks at a fancy new bar the next town over. After two martinis (hers) and two Johnnie Walker Reds (him), they stumble back out onto the sidewalk, having given up on talking over the din of the crowd.

“What’s the bloody point of a noisy bar?” Alec complains. “If you can’t hear your date, why go in the first place?”

Ellie takes his hand and with her other, tries to keep the wind from blowing her hair in her face. “Young people have more finely tuned hearing than we do,” she says. “Besides none of them are saying anything interesting enough to merit being heard.”

“Savage.”

She grins and he kisses her as they walk along the sidewalk.

“My place or yours?” He asks, stopping them in place so he can pull her against him.

“Dad can’t stay over, so mine,” Ellie replies. She slinks her arm up around his neck. As he bends his head to kiss her, she stops him. “Forgot to mention. Jenkinson says Lynch is leaving. The DI post opens up again next week.”

His eyes widen and he pulls back slightly to get a good look at her expression. “You goin’ in for it?”

She has a peculiar look on her face. Her eyes are sparkling but she has one eyebrow raised. There’s the _hint_ of a smile, but only that. “Dunno,” she answers, fingering the buttons of his shirt. The other hand massages the back of his neck. “Are _you_?”

***


End file.
